Bobrova and Soloviev out of Worlds

[2sk8]

I read this with shock that apparently these skaters are just letting random people inject them with drugs. And then I wandered down the hall to ask my coworker whose son is an elite level athlete (not skating) and she was honestly shocked. Her son has received injections to assist with soreness etc but only from his physician as part of an ongoing care and treatment for injuries (at that level who doesn't have injuries?), but they would never allow anyone else to do something like this on kind of a routine basis and she indicated the athletes are counseled against accepting treatment from event physicians just for this reason by their governing body before any international events....

It is quite common in some countries, Russia, ukraine etc., to rely on Fed Drs, in or out of competition, for injections. That doesn't make the outcome completely outside the athlete's responsibility. My experience has been that most of these athletes know the injections are questionable, but accept it for the possibility of improved performance.

 

[MacMadame]

I've had B12 injections, and they are evil, you couldn't pay me to have one unless it was a medical emergency. Surely there are less painful ways to enhance one's performance (in a WADA-approved manner)?

I'm not sure how many are taking B12. It mainly helps with fatigue but only if the fatigue is caused by having low B12. I have noticed that B12 is in a lot of my sports food though so there may be the belief that it helps or that athletes need more of it than regular guys.

I would like to see him keep skating... even if it is with a different lady.

Do you (and others who have suggested this) really think that he could find a new partner and be competitive for a world/olympic medal by the 2017-2018 season? It seems pretty close to impossible to me. Even if he found a new partner tomorrow, they'd have to qualify for the Olympics in less than two year's time.

I don't discount the slight possibility that Bobrova's vitamin/supplement mixture was doctored intentionally, but that would not have been a sure way to the get the team banned (even if you were confident they would medal). If it is the case that only one member of a pair or dance team is tested, to be certain of a failed drug test, you'd somehow need to get the drug into Nikita as well.

Since he wasn't tested, we don't know if he also took something and what was in it.

 

[Tesla]

I can only say for myself but Katya, in my opinion, is the last person in Russian Figure Skating Team, who would take dope intentionally.

But she did take this drug intentionally. Yes, she took it before the ban but she did take it intentionally. She isn't claiming a medical reason for taking it, so why did she take if she didn't need it for its intended purpose?

 

[Ka3sha]

But she did take this drug intentionally. Yes, she took it before the ban but she did take it intentionally. She isn't claiming a medical reason for taking it, so why did she take if she didn't need it for its intended purpose?

I should clarify myself: I do not believe that she took it intentionally after the 1st of January.

As for the previous using: it was legal, so she was taking it - I have no problems with that until it is not against the rules.
I still do believe that a lot of sportsmen, almost all of them, (not only Russian) are taking different drugs (not banned drugs) and it is a normal practice.

 

[Katha]

My question is, how are her statements going to influence proceedings? Because to me, though I have no expertise in these matters, they don't seem that fortunate?

She's giving the case against her two workable angles:
- First she admitted taking the drug before it was banned. Even though she hasn't got any of the illnesses it's supposed to treat.
- Secondly she admitted that the doctor injected her with an unlabeled substance and she accepted this injection.

So now she's given the governing bodies an argument in hand where they can claim that she knew how the drug worked, she had a history of using it, so it's plausible that she knew it goes quickly through her system and just miscalculated how long it would be detectable or she just assumed that a test for this newly banned substance wasn't yet available so took it anyway. And if they get at her from another angle, from the "doctor injected her with unknown substance" theory: They will claim that she is responsible for what goes into her body and will point to her statement that she accepted an injection without clarifying what was in it. That lots of other Russian athletes are being tested positive doesn't help her case either.

ETA: That various Russian athletes are failing doping tests for this substance could also be used as an argument that Russian doctors/Russian sports establishment thought they had an effective masking agent in place, but that this masking agent didn't do its job.

 

[Excidra]

How's the weather up there?

She knew the drug was banned. Yes.

But the question is, did she knowingly take it? And so far it's not at all clear.

Well winter isn't really my favorite season. Back to the real issue.

She is on record saying that she knew the drug was on the banned list. But still went ahead and took it. She is an elite athlete, not to mention that she represents a figure skating federation that dominates the sport, therefore, she has experts there to advise on these kinds of things. Whether she cared to seek that advice, no one knows. Still, she made a huge decision to take that drug and it could potentially cost her a career.

 

[ninjapirate]

Excidra, you can say you think she's lying(which is starting to become my position) but when you say "still went ahead and took it" or "she made a huge decision" it shows you're not following what is being claimed.

 

[Tinami Amori]

Now e-bay is suddenly selling boxes of "meldonium" pills ready to ship to Europe, USA, Canada..... . I emailed the guy, and he said they are selling like hot-cakes last 24 hrs, people who are not official athletes want them....
and the advertisement line is: MILDRONATE MELDONIUM USED by SHARAPOVA MARIA
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...S0&_nkw=meldonium&_sacat=0&afsrc=1&rmvSB=true

 

[Tesla]

Excidra, you can say you think she's lying(which is starting to become my position) but when you say "still went ahead and took it" or "she made a huge decision" it shows you're not following what is being claimed.

Well, she knew it was going to be on the banned list and took it anyway. I'm sure she is a lovely, generous, and caring person but she isn't an innocent lamb in this.

 

[Excidra]

Excidra, you can say you think she's lying(which is starting to become my position) but when you say "still went ahead and took it" or "she made a huge decision" it shows you're not following what is being claimed.

However way you slice this thing, I am still going to conclude that it was a huge decision on her part. I am sure she didn't have a laissez faire attitude when she decided to take the drug. I am interested to see how this unfold and what kind of repercussion this will have on her career.

 

[Xela M]

Well, she knew it was going to be on the banned list and took it anyway. I'm sure she is a lovely, generous, and caring person but she isn't an innocent lamb in this.

However way you slice this thing, I am still going to conclude that it was a huge decision on her part. I am sure she didn't have a laissez faire attitude when she decided to take the drug. I am interested to see how this unfold and what kind of repercussion this will have on her career.

Did you read her interview?

 

[aftershocks]

Now e-bay is suddenly selling boxes of "meldonium" pills ready to ship to Europe, USA, Canada..... . I emailed the guy, and he said they are selling like hot-cakes last 24 hrs, people who are not official athletes want them....
and the advertisement line is: MILDRONATE MELDONIUM USED by SHARAPOVA MARIA
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...S0&_nkw=meldonium&_sacat=0&afsrc=1&rmvSB=true

I wonder if Sharapova could sue to have her name disassociated with the advertising since she clearly has not offered her endorsement? Good grief ... what a pill-popping, greedy/ taking advantage of consumers culture!

Although, it's also not clear what people believe the product is actually going to do for them unless prescribed by a physician for actual medical reasons (heart problems/ diabetes, etc.)

 

[Tinami Amori]

I wonder if Sharapova could sue to have her name disassociated with the advertising since she clearly has not offered her endorsement? Good grief ... what a pill-popping, greedy/ taking advantage of consumers culture!

The seller is not using Sharapova for endorsement. He is stating a publicly known fact "product used by Sharapova", which is true, she confirmed it.
Read on the news that in pharmacies in Poland this drug is suddenly in high demand, flying off the shelves. (don't have an english link).

 

[aftershocks]

^^ Yes they are not using Sharapova's name as endorsement, but definitely for promotional exploitation.

I'm not questioning the veracity of this happening. I'm just aghast that the product is flying off the shelves. But one of the explanations could be that current users are urgently stocking up in fear that the product may be cracked down on in terms of future availability. I don't know, but I would hope that many of these buyers need to have a doctor's prescription prior to purchase?

 

[skatepixie]

Thinking of Bobrova's situation, I'm reminded of a story Oksana Chusovitina told to explain, in part, why she moved to Germany to get treatment for her son when he had cancer. She said at a major hospital in either Russia or Uzbekistan (can't remember), the chemotherapy drugs were replaced with placebos and sold on the black market by someone with access to the medicine. So children were put through chemo, or so they thought, but received placebos and died.

Judging from what I've been told by Kyrgyz and Kazakh friends about Uzbekistan, I'm willing to bet this was Uzbekistan.

 

[morqet]

How's the weather up there?

She knew the drug was banned. Yes.

But the question is, did she knowingly take it? And so far it's not at all clear.

Claiming that she unknowingly took it doesn't actually help her all that much.

WADA Anti Doping Code: https://wada-main-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/resources/files/wada-2015-world-anti-doping-code.pdf

10.2.1 The period of Ineligibility shall be four years where:

10.2.1.1 The anti-doping rule violation does not involve a Specified Substance, unless the Athlete or other Person can establish that the anti-doping rule violation was not intentional.
10.2.1.2 The anti-doping rule violation involves a Specified Substance and the Anti-Doping Organization can establish that the antidoping rule violation was intentional.​

10.2.2 If Article 10.2.1 does not apply, the period of Ineligibility shall be two years.

There's also the strict liability principle, which says that an athlete is responsible for any substance found in their body, whether they took it intentionally or not. https://www.wada-ama.org/en/questions-answers/strict-liability-in-anti-doping. There is some flexibility around this rule, but she has to prove that she was not at fault & was not seeking to enhance her performance. From what she's said about what happened, I don't think she's got much of a case: She was having a (what she thought was legal) injection, but it was administered by a doctor who she didn't usually work with, and she did not see him prepare the injection. It was on her to be 100% sure that she trusted what he was injecting her with, and it sounds like she didn't do that.

 

[Lis]

Many comments her about Bobrova and surpringly few about the doctor that gave her the injection.

As a sports doctor you have to be updated of what is ok, legal and what isn't. He has the main responsibility as any doctor of the patients treatment. If he injected an ilegal drug he can not work anymore as a sports doctor and should be banned.

I would very much like to hear the doctors story.

 

[Loves_Shizuka]

Now e-bay is suddenly selling boxes of "meldonium" pills ready to ship to Europe, USA, Canada..... . I emailed the guy, and he said they are selling like hot-cakes last 24 hrs, people who are not official athletes want them....
and the advertisement line is: MILDRONATE MELDONIUM USED by SHARAPOVA MARIA
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...S0&_nkw=meldonium&_sacat=0&afsrc=1&rmvSB=true

Some people are SHAMELESS.

 

[Rae35]

Now e-bay is suddenly selling boxes of "meldonium" pills ready to ship to Europe, USA, Canada..... . I emailed the guy, and he said they are selling like hot-cakes last 24 hrs, people who are not official athletes want them....
and the advertisement line is: MILDRONATE MELDONIUM USED by SHARAPOVA MARIA
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...S0&_nkw=meldonium&_sacat=0&afsrc=1&rmvSB=true

Not much shocks me in sporting terms, but this gets close.

 

[rhapsody]

Judging from what I've been told by Kyrgyz and Kazakh friends about Uzbekistan, I'm willing to bet this was Uzbekistan.

Also the fact that Oksana used to/and now lives back in Uzbekistan.

 

[rhapsody]

Some people are SHAMELESS.

This is actually kind of hilarious.

 

[dramatheater]

I firmly believe Russia is being "exposed" right before the Rio Olympics as part of the on-going Cold War and that doping of Americans and the Chinese (amongst other feds) is more advanced than in Russia

yep altho I totally disagree with you on politics as you know but I do totally think all is conncted in this situation
& even on largher scale

basically this post says it all

Evidence that Russia doesn't play by the rules (in any part sport, politics etc.) hardly news.
Next.

btw can it be reported here or these kinda posts like the above one & the below one are OK on this forum???

The Russians are cheaters. Simple.

The testing lab in Moscow where the Russian anti-doping program is based seems to be completely corrupt.

FYI if u read comments from Durmanov
All these 'corrupt' lab ppl were offered huge $$$$$$ to work in the US


As for B/S I totally feel even more sorry for Zhulin. It was such a great season for them even tho I'm a Sinkats fan I was very happy for them! Hopefully they will survive that & will be back!

 

[Loves_Shizuka]

This is actually kind of hilarious.

I know! Hence my rolling about

 

[rhapsody]

I know! Hence my rolling about

I was agreeing with you!

 

[Loves_Shizuka]

I was agreeing with you!

So I had a quick look on ebay - people are DESPERATE for it!

With five hours to go, one listing has 25 bids and is now up to £75, plus £90 p&p... WTH!

So you're talking at least £165 or about 210 euros/240 USD

To put that into context, in Latvia, where meldonium is from, it costs around $5 over-the-counter.

There must be a lot of people out there who want to make sure they don't get diabetes ...

 

[hanca]

My question is, how are her statements going to influence proceedings? Because to me, though I have no expertise in these matters, they don't seem that fortunate?

She's giving the case against her two workable angles:
- First she admitted taking the drug before it was banned. Even though she hasn't got any of the illnesses it's supposed to treat.
- Secondly she admitted that the doctor injected her with an unlabeled substance and she accepted this injection.

So now she's given the governing bodies an argument in hand where they can claim that she knew how the drug worked, she had a history of using it, so it's plausible that she knew it goes quickly through her system and just miscalculated how long it would be detectable or she just assumed that a test for this newly banned substance wasn't yet available so took it anyway. And if they get at her from another angle, from the "doctor injected her with unknown substance" theory: They will claim that she is responsible for what goes into her body and will point to her statement that she accepted an injection without clarifying what was in it. That lots of other Russian athletes are being tested positive doesn't help her case either.

ETA: That various Russian athletes are failing doping tests for this substance could also be used as an argument that Russian doctors/Russian sports establishment thought they had an effective masking agent in place, but that this masking agent didn't do its job.

I think you are looking at it from your own perspective. You decided that she is guilty (approach 'guilty until proven innocent', rather than 'innocent until proven guilty').

She took the drug before it was banned -so what? That doesn't prove any wrongdoing! If you read the interview with the person who invented the drug, you may understand why would person take it even without having a heart condition. At the level elite athletes are training, there is obviously huge strain on their heart and the drug can be used as preventative measure. As it was allowed, not illegal, I can't see how her admitting taking it in the autumn could possibly go against her.

Secondly, doctor did inject her with unknown substance, but there is a reason why she believed that it was not unknown substance. She received a legal medication from her doctor. She passed it on to the team doctor. She requested to have it injected. As far as she was concerned, she was getting what she requested. If you go to a doctor and doctor says he/she is giving you an antibiotics, you would trust the doctor that the medication is antibiotics and not a rat poison. Even though it is your life that is in question if it 'accidentally' was a rat poison, you just trust your doctor. If you buy a non alco beer and drive, you expect the beer to be non alco if the label said so, and would be unhappy if police checked you and told you that you were under influence of alcohol. Bobrova did not ask any John or Bob from the street to inject her any unknown substance that he was at that time having in his syringe. She asked their team doctor, a person one can safely believe she should be able to trust, to inject her a legal substance which she provided (received from her usual doctor). How far is she expected to check that it is really what she was receiving? She didn't see him actually filling it from the capsule, but it seems to me that it is like if you got to a shop, asked for a kilo of flour, got the bag with white powder and a few minutes later got busted for having a kilo of some illegal white powder drug. Do you think it is reasonable expectation, if you go to a normal shop, request a flour, receive a packet that looks like a flour, to believe that you have flour? As far as Bobrova was concerned, she requested receiving what she provided. Is every athlete expected to do a chemical analysis of everything that goes into their body? It wouldn't be practicable. The same way as every person can't do chemical analysis of everything you buy in a shop, and therefore you never know for certain what you will get if you ask for a bag of flour. And yet if you were busted for having a kilo of white powder drug after you just purchased it in a normal food shop, you would insist that you are innocent.

 

[Katha]

I think you are looking at it from your own perspective. You decided that she is guilty (approach 'guilty until proven innocent', rather than 'innocent until proven guilty').

I think the case against her has already started with her positive result, that's why she got the provisional ban. Now it's on her to provide evidence why the ban shouldn't be upheld/should be shortened/etc. And as morquet rightly said, the way she told the story about the injection and her not checking what was in it, that does make her responsible in the eyes of WADA. And about the rest: IMO Bobrova's story is a rather typical excuse dopers have been using since the beginning of time. It very well might be true in her case, I don't know. I wasn't there, I don't know anything. But the relevant sports bodies have heard stories like hers many, many times before. So I don't think it's absurd to suggest that they might look for holes in it, or might conclude that her familiarity with the drug coupled with her positive test throws the rest of her claims into question.

But I agree that since there is so little that's actually known, everyone will form an opinion and will start taking sides according to subjective perceptions. At a certain point discussion becomes sort of redundant, since everyone (including myself) is just reinforcing their own position.

 

[levineismine]

Updates:
ISU confirms positive A-samples for other skaters. Cases will be disclosed If B-samples analysis positive.
http://www.isu.org/en/news-and-events/news/2016/03/statement-adverse-analytical-finding

 

[Coco]

Whoa!

 

[Loves_Shizuka]

Deary me.